I just completed the installation procedure for the replacement lamp driver board and this projector is working likes its brand new !!!!

I can't be more excited about this. I saved all my "old bulbs" with only 1000 to 1500 hours on them. I have the oldest bulb in it now running at bright mode and the projector looks like it did the first day I powered it on!

I now have three bulbs (including a new one still in the box) that should last me for many years.

Great topic, I have an HD6800 from costco. I believe the bulb had around 700 hours on it, last time I used it. Well I went to power it up and I get nothing!

I took it apart, and the power supply is outputting 165V DC*, and the lamp is receiving 30V AC* (from the ballest), tested at the output from the ballest as well as the lamp socket. Is the lamp dead? I do not have another one to test it.

Again I see nothing on the panel on the top. I left it on for about 20 minutes and briefly saw both the LAMP & TEMP light flash a dim red, but that's it.

I have a brand new Optoma Ballast (Part number 75.83J01G002) to sell. I purchased it from Optoma fro $100, but never got to install it in my HD72. I bought a new projector and don't have time to fix the old one. I'm willing to sell the Ballast for $50. Please email me if anyone is interested.

Add me to the list of AVSers wishing to thank marcusm750 and the rest of the community for the great write up and information! My 72 tanked at 1280 hours with the exact symptoms as described here. New bulb and ballast as per the instructions, and all was operational within 30 minutes! I'll keep the OEM bulb as a spare, since it likely would have some life left (but I didn't want to push the new ballast with a possibly out of spec bulb).

It's still a great little PJ, and I'm glad that I could extend it for a bit longer

Thank you people above. To do something in return, I give my findings here.

I tried to repair the ballast itself, without any succes; the lamp was switched off within 1 minute.
I replaced the following parts, on the ballast board, for new one's:
- the 2 semiconductors on the heatsinks
- 4 MKT capacitors C1, C5, C13 and C17
- 1 FKP capacitor 3n3 F

Perhaps somebody knows what parts to replace?

Another thing: I noticed the air-gap's to the ballast weren't cut open through the plastic backplane. I did that myself with a sharp knife. Maybe not all gap's should be cut open, since there will be less air through the other gap's that were cut open in the factory.
Does anybody else have a closed backplane to the ballast, or is it only my projector?

Well .. this same thing just happened to my HD72 .. and I don't want to deal with troubleshooting it to get it going. If anyone wants to buy it and try and fix it .. or salvage it for parts .. I just put it up on ebay.

I do not intend this as spam whatsoever. I followed every free fix in this thread and found it very helpful .. but I do not want to invest money into a new bulb or lamp driver etc.

I just thought someone might want it instead of me tossing it in the trash.

Let me know if I'm sidetracking this issue, but I've recently started having a bulb issue on my HD72 (actually an HD6800, but I believe they're the same). The bulb only has about 130 hours on it. I watch for about 20 minutes and the image colours start flickering wildly, but most of the time, between the flickers the image is black and white... after 2 or 3 minutes of wild fluctuations the lamp turns off. The only way for me to turn off the unit at this point is for me to unplug as the power buttons don't respond.

Has anyone else had similar problems? Could it be the colour wheel and not the bulb that's causing the problem? Would a problem with the colour wheel cause the bulb to shut off with the bulb error light turned on?

Hopefully I can find my old bulb and give that a try, as it was functional, just getting old and dim.

After owning the HD72 for a while and putting about 1500 hours on it, the lamp started going out after being on for a few minutes. I sent it in for repair under warranty and Optoma said to just replace the bulb. They wanted to charge an absurd amount for the lamp, but agreed to price match an online price I showed them. They did not return original lamp as requested. I asked about the lamp driver, as I had read something about this online, and they essentially did not seem to think it was a problem, or even know what I was talking about.

1000 lamp hours later, I started having the same problem, so ordered a lamp for "cheap" (relatively speaking) online and was up and going again.

600 hours into this lamp, the picture is incredibly dim. Part of the base of the bulb has turned white, appears to be enlarged (melting?) and the "stem" has shifted off-center. Curiously, this lamp has an "Ra2" number on the back, where the older lamp has "Ra3." I have no idea if this is relevant, but it might be from a different (older?) production run.

I attempted to order a new lamp online, but after waiting a week I was told that the lamp was back ordered, with no ETA. I canceled that order and am attempting to order from another place that claims to have a small number in stock. Most sites I have seen have it marked as out of stock / back ordered (primarily Canadian sites).

having the same lamp turn off issues called optoma gave them the part number that was listed in the attachment for the replaement of the ballast they tell me that is not the correct part number for the ballast for an hd7

My HD72 is still going strong. The first bulb (if you see the thread history) got like 800 hours before the lamp driver replacement by Optoma. Then it died at about 1300 hours IIRC, and I replaced the bulb.

The current bulb is at 3300+ hours now. I'm having trouble with the projector occasionally powering down hard (no lights) and requiring unplugging / hard power switch off....which suggests a power supply issue (I've seen this behavior on PCs).

But the bulb is old and cranky (I see brightness flickering once in a while), so I think it's just occasionally wigging out the power supply.

Still working so far though (just needs a rest/power cycle every few weeks when it powers down).

"I believe that only scientists can understand the universe. It is not so much that I have confidence in scientists being right, but that I have so much in nonscientists being wrong." - Isaac Asimov

Seeing as how I was the guy who blasted Optoma for the worst customer support I've ever received (and still is to this day the worst I've ever experienced), I do want to report that over a year and a half after installing the new ballast myself that we received from Optoma, my original lamp finally gave out. So, the $150 I spent on the part (with shipping) ended up being the key to a happy ongoing experience with my projector. It's a shame it was such an ordeal to get the part from Optoma as that still sits fresh in my memory even 20+ months later. My next projector will likely be an Epson due to what is seen as pretty stellar support.

But, back to the topic. Considering my projector is now pushing 4 years old and still looks incredible, I went ahead and purchased a new bulb from purelandsupply and will be installing tonight. We'll take pics of how to install the bulb and post later if anyone wants step by step instructions on how to do this. So, for the initial purchase, plus $150 for the ballast, and now another ~$200 for a replacement bulb (this is not the entire assembly), I've got a projector that will likely last me another 3 years before any $$ is required - assuming nothing else goes wrong.

So, all that being said...I still love the HD72 - puts out a great picture. Optoma, regrettably has probably lost any future business from me due to their horrible dealings with me roughly 2 years ago. But, they did create a wonderful product, and after replacing the ballast, the thing has been rock solid.

Oh, and I believe I probably had roughly 2600-2700 hours on the original lamp before it went. Not too shabby.

Unfortunately, my wife beat me to the punch on installing the bulb so I wasn't able to take any pictures...but here's what I can tell you. She said she got the projector down, taken apart, bulb replaced and back up in 10 minutes. So, that should tell you that it's not too terribly hard. She did say that there were a lot of tiny screws so a small magnetic screwdriver set would be extremely helpful. Other than there there's a couple of connections on the bulb that have to be hooked up to the wiring and the lamp case was a bit of a pain she said, but otherwise wasn't bad.

Now, that being said...holy crap does my pj look good again!!! The only way I can describe it to you and maybe you'll understand is that feeling you get when you replace the tires on your car. You've been driving on worn out tires that need to be replaced, you finally get a WHOLE SET on your car and it feels brand new again. The HD72 hasn't looked this good in God knows how long. Honestly, the original bulb lasted us ~ 3 years. I was contemplating getting a new projector (Epson 8700UB) to replace this one, but now that I've put the new bulb in there, I'm actually more than content. The thing is shooting a beautiful picture - not saying the Epson wouldn't blow it out of the water, but I haven't seen it so I'm completely happy. For approx $210 with 2 day shipping, I couldn't be happier.

I really want to thank you all for being here and talking about this awful Optoma problem. Of course, I thought I was the only one that had ever experienced the "Huh? It's still on isn't it?" debacle... At least until two days ago when I found you all on the web and almost sobbed with relief.

Based on the 14-page tutorial, today I took the plunge and ordered the replacement driver from Optoma (they were very quick responding, BTW) and a new lamp from an Ebay'er (after making sure the OSRAM #'s matched, of course). Whole thing so far comes to $236, shipping included. Wish me luck!

Yesterday evening the bulb just went out. I have about 1400 hours on this bulb in last 18 months. The projector is about 4 years old and this is third bulb that went out with 800, 1200, and 1400 hours of lamp use. We generally watch/play at hours at a stretch, sometimes in Bright mode and sometimes in other settings.

While researching about the bulb, I came across this recommendation to change the Ballast Driver Board instead of bulb.

To make story short, how do I confirm that it is board and not the bulb? Your quick answer will be appreciated as I need to get it going to watch Super Bowl

Yesterday evening the bulb just went out. I have about 1400 hours on this bulb in last 18 months. The projector is about 4 years old and this is third bulb that went out with 800, 1200, and 1400 hours of lamp use. We generally watch/play at hours at a stretch, sometimes in Bright mode and sometimes in other settings.

While researching about the bulb, I came across this recommendation to change the Ballast Driver Board instead of bulb.

To make story short, how do I confirm that it is board and not the bulb? Your quick answer will be appreciated as I need to get it going to watch Super Bowl

Thank you.
Ashwini

Sounds like the lamp driver to me. I think your bulb lifetimes definitely show that. I can't help that much - I called Optoma after the first bulb started acting up (at 800 hours) and they had me send it in...they put the new lamp driver in and the bulb lasted to about 1400 hours before doing the same thing.

Do you still have the old bulbs? Some of the other folks in here put their old bulb back in after the lamp driver board replacement and had it working perfectly.

My current (2nd bulb) is finally exhibiting problems - it will run for hours on some nights, and on other nights, it shuts off after an hour or so (requiring unplugging the projector for a few hours). But it's at 3100+ hours.

"I believe that only scientists can understand the universe. It is not so much that I have confidence in scientists being right, but that I have so much in nonscientists being wrong." - Isaac Asimov

Can any of you tell me what kind of static precautions I can take if I don't have a non-static bag or grounded workstation to do this with? Someone said to just use aluminum foil, but how does that help? Do I have to ground myself to anything before I open the bag, or after? Kinda nervous about making a 100 dollar mistake here (and waiting two more weeks for another board, as well)...

Can any of you tell me what kind of static precautions I can take if I don't have a non-static bag or grounded workstation to do this with? Someone said to just use aluminum foil, but how does that help? Do I have to ground myself to anything before I open the bag, or after? Kinda nervous about making a 100 dollar mistake here (and waiting two more weeks for another board, as well)...

Thanks..!

Don't worry about it. I've dealt with tons of electronics most costing much much more and never had a problem. If you have a lot of static build up from walking around on your carpet or something just touch the edge of a wall before starting.

Switched the driver board out in about an hour (was being over-cautious; coulda done it in about 30 minutes or less, I guess). Slapped the old lamp back in, too. Fired right up; no problems. Now we've got about 10 hrs on it and nothing bad going on so far.

I was actually shocked how easy it was to switch. If you've ever installed or swapped out a component like a hard drive in a PC, you can do THIS.

Great site! been a lurker for years! Its also very nice to see that everyone still continues to post and contribute.

I am having a similar problem with my hd72/hd6800. My projector is on its original bulb and has about 500 hours over 5 years. Today i am able to turn it on, but the lamp wont light up. I hear the fan start and stop a few times and then the lamp light comes on. I noticed a previous poster had a similar experiance, has there been any solutions to this issue or woudl you think it too can be the ballace?

OK, I had this problem 2 years ago with 1100 hours on the bulb. I sent the projector into Optoma Canada for "out of warranty service" because I figured it had to more than just changing the bulb. I cost me $120 to diagnose the problem, their prognosis... I needed a new bulb. They told me they would install one for $399. I passed on the offer and purchased one online for about $100. The HD72 worked well up until last month when the same issue came up, this time 1180 hours.After thinking it over I placed an order for a 60" Plasma (boxing day sale) and put my remote screen up for sale on Kijiji.

Well I kept thinking, and I hate the thought of watching a smaller image. Which brings me back here. Two years ago I thought it would be the lamp driver assembly, but Optoma did not come to that conclusion. After reading nearly this entire thread I am convinced that the lamp is probably fine and I need to replace the driver assembly. Last night I emailed Optoma for a price and delivery for the part, today I get a response,
"Unfortunately, we do not ship to Canada. Please, contact globalsemi.com".
I'm thinking no problem, I check out Globalsemi.com...good site, punch in the optoma part number and hold my breath. WOW! The part is listed!! But the price is $297!! I read in earlier posts that some were paying $100 in the US. I figured if I could get the part for a reasonable cost I would fix it, but now I am not so sure.
I apologize for the long winded post but my questions are.
Is this a reasonable price? How much are others paying? Does anyone have any recommendations for me?
Thanks

[quote=Flipp1972;21467421]OK, I had this problem 2 years ago with 1100 hours on the bulb.

There were some version of the projector , mine included, where the firmware had a bug...My PJ counts at half speed, i.e. for every two hours on the bulb, one hour gets added to the lamp hours count.my first bulb went at 3000 hours, but PJ menu only showed 1500 hours.

FWIW there was a great PDF in this thread somewhere someone made if you do decide to change lamp driver